by Luca Veste
Her last dose ended fatally, unfortunately for her.
Throughout history, man has attempted to understand the complexities of life. Why are we here? What is our purpose? I am attempting to prove my answer to those questions.
We are here only to die.
Think of every funeral you’ve ever been to. The grief people exude from themselves. It becomes one with the atmosphere, an almost physical feeling in the air. Death is natural, yet people somehow make it unnatural. They say things such as ‘it wasn’t his time’ or ‘taken too soon’ as if that bears any relation to the fact that whether it be one year or a hundred, the result is still the same.
Death is inevitable, yet people are always surprised when it happens.
What do we experience at the moment of death? How can we ever know that feeling? Without research, without experimentation, we are no nearer an answer to these questions.
So enjoy it.
This is just the beginning of my work. To discover more about life … through death.
‘Great. We need to find him fast.’ Murphy said as he’d finished reading the letter.
‘He?’ Houghton replied.
‘Just a guess. Could be her I suppose. This is my copy, yes?’
Houghton nodded, waved his hand away. ‘Yeah, original has gone to forensics. What is it then?’
‘You didn’t read it?’ Murphy said. ‘Thought you’d have had your nose right into this by now. Well, apart from some screwed-up talk about death, there’s something about the effects of LSD on humans, and some shite about something called MK Ultra and Operation Midnight Climax. Sounds like I’ve stumbled across a screenplay of the new James Bond film.’
‘I’ve heard of Operation Midnight Climax,’ Houghton replied. ‘It was a CIA thing. Linked with the whole MK Ultra deal. You must have heard about it.’
Murphy stared at Houghton, who looked as though he was trying to keep his round face straight. A trace of a smile threatened to break out, the lines on his face creasing further.
‘No I haven’t smartarse, what is it?’ Murphy said.
‘Touchy, aren’t you? You could just bow to my superior knowledge you know.’
‘Consider me bowed. Now explain.’
Murphy moved aside as Houghton scanned what he’d been reading. ‘From what I remember, Operation Midnight Climax was a psychology experiment to show the effects of LSD on people. They would give people doses of acid without their knowledge and then watch the effects of the drug on them through two-way mirrors. They filmed ordinary men with prostitutes in an attempt to see if anything could be used in conjunction with possible mind control efforts. All very secret and clandestine. It was shut down in the sixties, but some people think the US government still does this sort of thing.’
Murphy tried to take it all in. ‘So the government was giving acid to people without their knowledge, and then filmed them with prostitutes?’ Murphy said. ‘Seems pretty pointless.’
‘Yeah, all it did really was add to the growing acid usage in the sixties,’ Houghton replied.
‘What does this have to do with the girl though?’
‘Well, that’s for you to find out, you’re the detective.’
‘Okay, so we have a letter taped to a dead girl, about the government giving LSD to people in the sixties. It also talks about death and the way people react to it being unnatural.’
‘That about sums it up.’
‘We don’t know how she died yet.’
‘The PM will be done later on,’ Houghton said. ‘We’ll know more then.’
Murphy walked around the table, becoming aware of a pain growing behind his eyes. Another headache coming on probably.
‘So, she’s got strangulation marks around her neck, but this letter says she died of too much acid?’
‘I’m willing to bet that we find a large amount of LSD in the girl’s system, but it will have to be a ridiculously large amount to be the cause of death. Any luck with identifying her yet?’
‘Laura’s looking into it now. I should get back and help out.’
‘Okay, will one of you be coming for the show?’
Murphy gave him a sneer. ‘Show? Such class.’
‘Okay, sorry. The post-mortem.’ Houghton used his fingers to make quotation marks around his last two words, which made Murphy smile a little.
‘I’m sure I’ll draw the short straw of having to subject myself to being in your company for a lengthy amount of time.’
Murphy left Houghton’s office, once again thankful that no matter the pitfalls of life in the police, at least his office wasn’t located in a hospital. His energy began to return. His stomach still gurgled and growled, but it barely bothered him. Purpose. He had purpose again.
Righting wrongs, doing good – that kind of thing was why he’d joined the police twelve years earlier. Applied for CID as soon as he was allowed. Breaking up fights in town and dealing with domestic violence got tiring within months. It wasn’t for him. Murphy wanted to be Sherlock Holmes, not the local bobby.
Took him about three minutes on his first day in CID to realise no bugger there was Sherlock. Mostly, it was menial work, small things. Domestic cases, in the main. Of course, it wasn’t always as soft as all that. Some cases, they still stuck with him, forever marked in his mind. He bore the scars well for the most part. Sometimes he boiled over, but surely that was to be expected. That’s why this case was so important. He had much to make up for.
In the past, when his line of work was discussed at parties or barbeques, he had to dampen the expectations of the normals. With murder, it was almost always someone the victim knew. Much of the time, it was a partner, or ex. Domestic violence they call it. Carried out by vile little men, who are useless for anything other than using their power over women.
That’s why the letter didn’t bother him. He wanted to play the odds. Whoever had killed the girl was probably someone close to her. Someone she knew. The letter was probably some kind of distraction technique. Left to throw them off the scent.
Murphy had seen this kind of thing before.
Which meant that what was most important, was finding out who she was.
5
Sunday 27th January 2013 – Day One
Another dead end.
Not literally, which was a good thing she supposed, but she wished it was easier to identify someone when you had next to nothing to go on.
Everyone should be tagged. Like a pet. No … that was too weird. Too Orwellian.
‘Mannagia alla miseria.’
Rossi’s voice was quiet amongst the racket of the room as she expressed her frustration in Italian at the lack of answers from the computer. Her mind kept flashing back to the lifeless face of the young woman they’d found that morning.
It wasn’t her first murder case. In the two years she’d been a detective sergeant, she’d been part of four murder investigations. Three of them were domestic cases. Two women in their forties and fifties. A sixty-three-year-old man. The other, a stabbing outside a nightclub in Concert Square; a fight over someone’s girlfriend going too far. The lad with the knife had been sentenced a few weeks earlier. Twelve years. He’d be out before he was thirty. She shook her head … worthless.
She loved the job. That was the main thing. Growing up, she hadn’t been one of those kids who reeled off a list of things they wanted to be when they were older. She’d shrug her shoulders when asked. Went to uni, studied Sociology, and when she left and realised jobs with that degree were pretty limited, fell into policing.
She’d grown up pretty quick after that. Twenty-three years old and splitting up fights between blokes twice her size in town. She’d got her head down and worked through it, before she was fast-tracked into CID. It was then she realised this was what she was born to do, even if her parents didn’t agree. To them she was still the baby of the family.
But this was the first time she’d seen herself in the victim. She was a few years older than the dead girl, but clos
e enough in age that she could remember being her not too long ago. She wasn’t supposed to feel that way, to put herself in the victim’s position. Distance was supposedly key. That’s what they’d drummed into her in training.
She pushed her hair behind her ear, away from her face, and knocked the pen that had been balancing there onto the floor. She bent down to pick it up.
‘While you’re down there.’
Rossi sat up quickly as she saw Brannon standing next to her desk, wearing one of those ridiculous false grins he always seemed to wear. She rolled her eyes. ‘What do you want?’
‘Just seeing how you are getting on. Could be a big case, this. Just want to make sure you know my expertise is available if you run into any trouble.’
She could almost taste the morning sweat emanating from him, mixing with the cheap bodyspray he wore to try to hide it.
‘I’m fine.’
‘Well,’ Brannon replied, shifting some of the paper on her desk so he could sink his large arse onto the edge, ‘I just want you to know I’m here.’ He leaned over her, one hand on the desk, the other hanging loosely near her right shoulder. ‘And I’ll be waiting for you to fuck up. I’ll be right in there. Got it?’
‘Vaffanculo, Brannon.’
He sat back, a question mark on his moisture-ridden face. ‘What’s that mean?’
Rossi smiled, ‘An old Italian phrase. Now get off my desk before I let the boss know you’re the one who used her cup last week.’
Rossi flinched in spite of herself as Brannon leaned forward, his hand on the arm of her chair. His face was only a few inches away from hers as he smiled. ‘Listen. Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing. Flashing a bit of leg, smiling at the right people. Well, it’s not going to work. Just because our famous nutty DI wants you to partner him on what’ll be his latest, and hopefully last, fuck-up, don’t think it makes you better than me. You’ll be sussed out soon enough and then we can ship you out to where you belong.’
Rossi met his gaze. ‘You finished, or do I have to get my magnifying glass out, find your dick, and rip the fucking thing off you Pezzo di merda?’
Brannon shaped as if to say something, then plastered the grin back on. ‘Yeah, well. We speak English here. You just remember what I said.’
‘Yeah, yeah.’ Rossi replied, waving him away with the back of her hand. She picked up one of the print-outs of a missing person and pretended to read it, waiting for him to leave.
Bastard. She should introduce him to her mum. Mamma Rossi would have him begging for forgiveness within three seconds.
Her dad would just kill him. Probably.
Not important. She had work to do. She wanted to find a name before Murphy returned. Prove herself. Make their partnership more permanent.
Most importantly … not make any mistakes.
Murphy wiped his mouth free of crumbs from the sandwich he’d picked up on the way back from the hospital, shoved the napkin in his pocket as he stepped out of the lift and walked down the short corridor towards the incident room. He steeled himself, and pushed open the doors.
The noise from earlier on had died down to an acceptable level. Murphy headed straight to his desk, not for the first time wishing he wasn’t six foot four and instantly filling a room. He wanted to lie low for a while; at least until they had a name. Maybe check on some CCTV if any had been delivered. Basically keep his head down and hope no one noticed his need to be anywhere else but there right then. He knew all eyes would be on him, remembering the last time he’d been in charge of a murder investigation. Sure, it wasn’t completely his fault how screwed up that had gone, but mud sticks. He couldn’t mess this one up.
‘Sir.’
Rossi had snuck up on him whilst he was keeping his head down over his desk. Typical. ‘Got a name?’ he asked her.
‘Not yet. Just checking on whether anyone on the missing list had a tattoo or something. What did Houghton have to say?’
Murphy filled her in on what had been discovered on the victim. He tried to play it off as being a red herring, but he saw her eyes light up as he explained the content, giving her a copy of the letter, which she quickly began scanning.
‘MK Ultra. What’s that?’ Rossi said, as Murphy leaned back in his chair. ‘Sounds familiar.’
‘Some weird psychology thing according to Houghton,’ Murphy replied. ‘The CIA were involved … I don’t know, it’s all very confusing. You went to university, you should know about that sort of thing.’
‘I did Sociology, not Psychology.’
‘What’s the difference?’
‘Well, Sociology is like Psychology, but without the rules,’ Rossi replied.
‘What’s that mean?’
‘It’s supposed to be an insult to Sociology students, but to be honest, it’s probably true.’
Murphy shook his head and turned back to the letter. He’d read it over and over now, without really getting any more information than the first time he’d read it. His attention began wandering, his desk now becoming his main focus. Would be nice to have an office. That had gone recently. They needed the space, apparently. Now he had a desk and a small filing cabinet of his own. He’d managed to fill both within a week. Murphy always meant to tidy it up, but never seemed to find the time. Besides, he enjoyed the clutter. Box files took up half the desk, his barely used computer, the other.
‘So what do we think then?’ Rossi said.
‘I think it’s a hoax, but we’re not discounting it. Likelihood is, it’s something to throw us off. The PM is happening soon, couple of hours probably. Houghton has put a rush on it, so hopefully he’ll have made a mistake.’
‘You want me to go?’
‘Not if you don’t want to, Laura. I know you’re not the biggest fan of them,’ Murphy said.
‘I’m surprised you’re still willing, you know … after that whole … thing.’
‘My parents died, Laura, it’s not a thing. You can say it.’
‘I know. I just don’t like bringing it up,’ Rossi replied.
Murphy noticed her shifting on her feet, plainly uncomfortable with the conversation. It’d been the same since it happened. Everyone waiting for him to show weakness. He’d become adept at the whole stiff upper lip deal though, not showing or sharing anything. It was better that way, he’d decided. Move on and forget.
It was becoming harder to forget though. And the dreams came more often.
His phone beeped in his pocket, ‘You go, Laura. It’ll be good to get some more experience under your belt. You’ll get used to it at some point,’ Murphy said, giving her a supportive pat on her shoulder as he took his phone out.
Rossi’s shoulders slumped a little but she began to nod her head. ‘Okay, okay I’ll go. I’ve left the possible missing persons on my desk. I’ll bring them over before I leave.’
‘Good,’ Murphy said, looking at his phone. ‘You best get a move on, it starts at twelve.’ He waved the phone at her. Rossi trudged off towards her desk.
Murphy began going through the messages on his answer machine, deleting the ones he deemed not needed. Rossi dropped a file containing some papers on his desk, whilst simultaneously pointing at Murphy’s computer and mouthing ‘use that’ to him. Murphy gave her a two-fingered salute as Rossi smiled and walked away.
Nothing of importance on his voicemail as usual, so he opened the file of missing persons. He pictured the victim in his mind; short, around five foot four inches, brunette, average build, not skinny or fat, just normal. She’d been wearing a red jumper and black trousers. She had a mole on her neck he remembered. Not overly large, but noticeable.
And dead, he thought – let’s not forget that.
It’d been a while since Murphy had been in contact with a dead victim. He’d been dealing with teenagers mostly. Serious assaults, drugs, teenage boys always seeming to be involved. Lives wasted before they’d even begun. Their sneers matching the dogs they always had on short leads. It reminded him of life on the counci
l estate he’d grown up on. The kids he’d knocked around with then would probably not be in the same lofty position he occupied now. More likely to come across them during an investigation than any other way.
It was something Murphy thought of often. The different paths life can take. He was no different to those lads at that age, doing stupid things, getting into trouble. Nothing that serious though. Few fights here and there. He’d been over six foot tall from the age of thirteen, which made him stand out. He’d been to the local boxing club for a while but gave up when he realised spending time with his mates and girls was more enjoyable to him. His parents had been a constant presence however. Always trying to lead him into a better way of living. He pushed back at first, tried to defy everything they attempted to instil in him. As he got older, more mature, he calmed down. Met his first wife at twenty, divorced at twenty-one. Married too young, but it gave focus to his life.
It had led to him doing a job he loved. But it wasn’t without its dark moments.
Some so dark and personal, he had trouble letting them go. Kept him awake at night, dead eyes staring down at him in the darkness.
Murphy tried to clear his head. He needed to focus and find a name for the girl. He started reading the names of the missing. They had DCs doing the same work in the room, yet Murphy would share the load. There wasn’t much else he could do at the moment. No CCTV to look at, witnesses to interview. Finding the name of the victim was the most important thing they could do right now.
An hour later, it came.
‘I’ve got it. Donna McMahon.’ Murphy looked up from his computer screen at the DC standing over him. DC Harris. Murphy was sure this time.
‘Positive, Harris?’ Murphy replied, hoping he was right.
‘Pretty much,’ DC Harris replied, smiling briefly, before quickly becoming serious-faced again.
At least he remembered some names, Murphy thought.
‘What do you mean “pretty much”?’
‘It was the mole that did it. The only distinguishing feature we had to go on really. Matches the description we have, just getting a picture now.’
